


one more step, I'll go

by taonsils (mirokkuma)



Series: card fills [7]
Category: EXO (Band)
Genre: (past taohun), Angst and Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Unrequited Love, japan based
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-04
Updated: 2018-02-04
Packaged: 2019-03-13 15:30:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,833
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13573509
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mirokkuma/pseuds/taonsils
Summary: “Being loved feels nice.” Zitao’s gone. Gone for good. It’s just the two of them and Chanyeol’s feelings now. “I’m selfish.”





	one more step, I'll go

**Author's Note:**

> [trope bingo card fill ▲ prompt: road trip]
> 
> [this](https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/yasui-kompiragu-shrine) is the shrine they visit. [these](https://taiken.co/single/ema-boards-meaning-and-use) are ema. (the love hotel is also real). tao is aroace, because I’m me, so of course. these are real places but honestly I’ve had parts of this concept kicking around for years, so they’re written from old drafts and nostalgia and probably inaccurate. this is..hmm..probably the peak of me enjoying mellow slice of life, sorry (´っ･ω･)っ  
> title is from the lyrics for Fall and seemed appropriately open ended‧˚₊*̥

They just seem to walk and walk.  
  
“Hyung,” Sehun’s voice is muffled by his scarf. The cold bites at his face without it, but underneath it he’s damp. His legs are numb but his shirt is starting to stick to his back. “Hyung. Chanyeollie-hyung,” he scoots a little faster to match Chanyeol’s pace and catch him up, “Where are we going?”   
  
“Obviously we have to see Kiyomizu-dera if we’re in Kyoto.”   
  
“Obviously,” Sehun parrots, but he’s not sure that it is. Obvious. All that’s obvious to him is the entire feigned spontaneity of their adventures around Japan taking a sudden diversion. He knows what Chanyeol is like when he has a plan. Up until now they’ve mapped out all of their days together, in advance.   
  
When they were at the station Chanyeol took the guide they were given along with their bus passes, folded it and stuffed it in his bag. He pulled out his phone once they reached their stop and didn’t offer for Sehun to help navigate. Sehun has no clue where they even are. Kyoto hasn’t really looked how he expected it to so far. Sort of still like Osaka, but how he imagines it would have been 30 years ago.   
  
“Hyung, not that I’m questioning your navigation skills. But the massive tourist trap with all the signs for a temple is..” Sehun points to their right. Chanyeol slaps his hand down and holds it down, pulls Sehun along by it in the direction they were already heading.   
  
“Later,” Chanyeol says over his shoulder, “There’s somewhere else we’re going first.”   
  
They have to go single-file now as sightseers start to appear in groups, Chanyeol dragging Sehun along. Sehun laughs as they weave through the crowded street, against the tide of people heading the right way for the hill. There’s a crowd gathered at the main crossing leading to the temple. Tourists from in and outside of Japan, hard to squeeze between with big cameras around their necks and backpacks taking up the space of a person. Breaking through the other side is like stepping out of a rush hour subway.   
  
When they reach the next crossing Chanyeol pauses to check his phone.   
  
“Hyung, it’s cold,” Sehun tries to wheedle again, and this time he can tug at Chanyeol’s hand. They didn’t come here to do tourist things. “Weren’t we gonna go to the stop next to Nanba today? I thought you wanted to go to the big Animate store.”   
  
“Yeah.” It’s mostly cloudy, but the grey sky is bright. Chanyeol tries shielding his screen with a sleeve. “There’s time, we can do it tomorrow. Stay the night here, travel back in the morning - it’ll work out.”   
  
“We’re staying?”   
  
Chanyeol’s mouth slants unhappily. “Problem? I thought we could do like, at least one traditional thing while we’re here.”   
  
“Sure.” It’s not that Sehun isn’t amiable to wherever their trip takes them, it’s just.. unplanned, kinda weird. Chanyeol’s the one with the strong connections to Japan. He’s the one reading the subway signs and getting emotional in conbinis when songs he’s loved since he was a child play from the speakers above the refrigerators. Sehun’s not even sure if he asked or Chanyeol offered to make this about the two of them.   
  
Chanyeol leads them left, downhill, and the asphalt under their feet turns into slabs of white paving. Their surroundings are residential now. They’re the only two on the whole road; just rows of small, warped wooden frames with saucers of rain-softened salt on their doorsteps. It’s like the temple and tourist busses and the crush of trying to get a single decent photo in Gion is a whole city away, not just one street.   
  
“Quiet,” Sehun thinks aloud. They’re only halfway down the hill, but he can’t hear any traffic at all. Chanyeol’s still frowning at his phone, shielding the screen from the dappled sunlight. “Where are we go~ing~” Sehun tries again, stamping his feet, being cute for his hyung. It always works.   
  
“Here,” Chanyeol scrolls from the map to the title of the page and holds up his phone. “It’s a shrine. How much hiragana have you learned?”   
  
Sehun frowns. He steadies Chanyeol’s hand with both of his own so he can read the small characters as they walk. “Something about cheap food?”   
  
“Different reading of _yasui_.”   
  
At least he read it. Yasui Konpira-gu.   
  
“We ate konpira,” Sehun says, dropping Chanyeol’s hand. “On the train into Osaka.” A palm sized plastic container with all these woody little sticks of carrot and burdock root. Hijiki, too. Sehun poked it around with one square-ended chopstick until Chanyeol disposed of it for him in three mouthfuls.   
  
Chanyeol tuts. “That’s _kinpira_. Oh Sehun, are you learning anything?”   
  
“That you’re the worst hyung ever and this is the worst trip ever.” It’s not like he studies this with the same enthusiasm. Maybe he wouldn’t care at all if it weren’t for Chanyeol lighting up when Sehun seems interested. “So what’s this shrine for, anyway?”   
  
Chanyeol tugs his scarf up above his chin. “Relationships.”   
  
“Specifically?”   
  
“Specifically, uh..“ Chanyeol knows, of course, he’s done his research. Had this in mind since they were arguing about whether to eat bibimbap in Nagoya (Chanyeol gets homesick for food, and Sehun can’t see the point in coming over here just to eat what they could have any other time). It feels less like he’s being an entire asshole if someone else phrases it. “ _At the heart of the shrine is what’s known as the enkiri stone_ ,” he reads from his phone, tracing along the sentence with a fingertip, “ _This roughly translates as a stone that will bind good relationships tighter and sever bad ones_.”   
  
_Oh_ , Sehun thinks as they stop at the end of the hill. The white paving slabs are gone, uneven grey stones now, and there are two Komainu on posts framing the path ahead. _Doggies_.   
  
“Hyung, should we have brought an offering?” There was a Family Mart down one of the turnings they walked past, with it’s recognisable sign in unfamiliar colours, like it’d been left to fade in the sun. This place really feels like some weird loop in time. Sehun could run back there and find something. Two mikan in a polystyrene tray, wrapped in plastic. Mikan are too bitter for him; the deities could have both.   
  
“You crawl through it - the stone. There’s a hole. It looks kind of weird.”   
  
Sehun laughs. The path is yellow with wet leaves and lined with parked cars. They must be approaching the shrine from the back.   
  
“It says you write your name and wish on paper,” Chanyeol continues. He’s frowning again. His ears were already pink from the cold, but it’s spreading down into his scarf. “Then you crawl through the hole one way to strengthen a relationship, or the other way to sever one. Then stick the wish on the stone.”   
  
Huh. Sehun’s always been a little lazy when it comes to extroverted activities. Lighting some incense is more on his level. “Do you think it really works?”   
  
“Huang believes in all this spiritual stuff, right? So if you want it to work, I think it’ll work.”   
  
“Huang.” Sehun slips his hand between Chanyeol’s waist and elbow. “How do we get the message to him if it’s all formal like that? There’s millions of Huangs out there.”   
  
Chanyeol sighs heavily. “Huang Zi-ta-o. Let’s get going, or we won’t find out.” He gives Sehun a sharp tug by their linked arms, and Sehun giggles into his scarf as he stumbles along.   
  
It’s just the way Chanyeol is. He was in love with Sehun before Zitao arrived in Korea, and he’s only more in love with him now.   
  
  
  
“I won’t fit through there.”   
  
Chanyeol plants his hands on his hips. It.. well, it sure is a stone. Seeing it in person doesn’t make that more impressive than it sounded. “The gods didn’t account for someone as broad as you needing any luck, huh.”   
  
“Lots of other people must fit.” Sehun leans his weight onto his toes, peering at the layered strips of paper.   
  
“Hmm.” Chanyeol’s not sure what he was expecting from the place, really. Not all tourist sites even list it as somewhere in the Higashi district to visit, despite the short walk from such a big attraction. _Somewhere you may stumble upon after a drunken night in Gion_ is what the place he was getting directions from described it as, and, yeah. It’s basically just a courtyard between two shrine gates, the ema, the stone. Maybe it was just an atmosphere thing he was hoping for. Damp and cold, mostly. Hmm.   
  
The hanging lanterns and even one of the screen doors of a building off to the side have unrepaired tears. The sign explaining the site and main shrine is only in Japanese. Sehun tells everyone he’s fine, already over it, accepted it. It’s not like Zitao _dumped him_ , it was just..their circumstances became impossible. Sad, yeah, but he’s fine. That tight, cold smile that unnerves Chanyeol, because it’s not Sehun at all.   
  
“I didn’t actually bring you here to get you stuck in a stone.”   
  
“I’m cold, hyung,” Sehun stuffs both hands in his pockets and starts walking again. The ema at the centre of the yard are all fresh unweathered wood, so obviously people do visit this place. “What are people praying for?”   
  
Chanyeol can’t actually read all that much kanji yet, despite the way he puffs up with importance whenever he successfully reads a menu or navigates them on a complicated map. From what he _can_ read, though, same kinds of things shrines are always filled with - happiness for the family, losing weight, success for idols, tourists who don’t understand and have just written a message.   
  
“You know, some shrines do have like, a specific purpose, but people just pray for whatever they want,” he mutters, lifting a wooden plaque with his fingertip to peek at the one underneath. Ah. “This one says ‘to break up peacefully’.” Well, “Not _exactly_ that, the word is more like hoping to like, untangle yourself from..yeah. Sorry.”   
  
“Nerd,” Sehun sounds fond. Fond, still, despite Chanyeol wasting a day of their trip and getting him cold to come and see a stone. Even the symbolism of the stone is kinda wasted, seeing as Sehun can’t pass through it. Chanyeol jogs on his heels. “So,” Sehun says, “Go see if we can write one, I guess.”   
  
  
Sehun is still looking at the ema when Chanyeol shuffles back to report that no, they can’t. The place is shut up for the day (or week. Or season, maybe, the office looked kinda grey and still inside). When Chanyeol visited on his own last summer the sound of ema gently knocking together in a breeze was something he’d liked a lot. Sehun visited Zitao’s hometown while he was here. Too cold already today, even without any wind.   
  
Sehun waves a hand dismissively. “We visited, I’m sure it helped.” The Japanese dictionary Chanyeol installed for him is open on his phone. “I liked looking around. Sent off some vibes and things.”   
  
Readjusting his scarf, Chanyeol gives Sehun a moment longer looking over the ema and then steps in to wrap him back up too. “Wanna leave through the entrance? We’ll get a different view going back. We can actually go to Kiyomizu if you want.”   
  
A different view, like some back alleys instead of a parking lot. Sehun hums loudly, tilts his head until it’s almost on Chanyeol’s shoulder. “You want me to walk all the way up that mountain to a temple half the tourists in Japan are at?”   
  
Chanyeol’s flapping his hands and Sehun’s sighing as he feels for his pocket to slip his phone back in, and they both see the sign at the same time. Black with purple text and a butterfly, framed by the shrine gate. Not even trying to not obviously be a love hotel.   
  
“Well. That’s.. ironic.”   
  
“Convenient,” Sehun says, and it goes hot and sharp into Chanyeol’s stomach. “For breaking up or strengthening.”   
  
“I guess, yeah.” Really convenient, huh. Chanyeol lifts the hem of his hoodie out the way so he can check his right front and back pockets for his bus pass. When he looks back up Sehun is watching him. “Just back to the station then?” he gestures with a sleeve.   
  
Maybe if they’d stayed in Osaka, gone to look for anime figures like Chanyeol had wanted to, Sehun wouldn’t be looking at him like that. But he is- was, and it unnerves Chanyeol when he smiles.   
  
“Pull me back up the hill,” Sehun flattens his mouth, sullen little thing for his favourite hyung. Chanyeol folds Sehun’s arm around his waist and he does, right up as far as the crossing with the crowds.   
  
He can hold Sehun’s hand and spoon him in bed and say _of course I am, I probably always will be_ when Sehun asks Chanyeol if he’s still in love with him, and it doesn’t hurt. It’s comfortable, somehow. Chanyeol’s made his own prayers in the past and maybe he just got lucky, had some merciful deity listen to him. He wouldn’t risk this for the world.   


•

  
_Doing something traditional_ is noodles in the food hall under Kyoto station. Sehun’s disappointed their dishes don’t have the same fabric maple leaves as the window display and tucks his phone in his pocket for the rest of the time they’re there. The snacks they pick up on the walk back to the hotel are more of a success. It’s mostly the same food they’ve been grabbing wherever they’ve stayed, but here the packaging is different.   
  
Their hotel is a block from the nearest bus terminals and looks exactly how Sehun expects a place that allows on the day bookings would. Kyoto is glamorous if you stick to the bus routes, just another city if you stray. The place is half traditional half western, but Sehun’s pretty sure there were ones like this up in Akita too. It’s an atmosphere thing, maybe, and traditional was cheaper anyway. Surprisingly, they thought, until it became clear why winter and summer rates differ so drastically. It’s fucking _freezing_.   
  
  
“We’re real tourists now,” Sehun says, less because they’re sitting on tatami, more because he’s probably being a moron and the kettle would be heating if he could read a word on the small card beside it.   
  
Chanyeol makes some sound that’s probably agreement. He only part turns his head, and Sehun sees the flash of teeth. He recognised the host on whatever show the tv turned on to and has been watching it keenly, laughing loud despite the lack of context. This trip really was for him, even if today was for Sehun.   
  
For the price it’s a huge room. There’s even a sliding screen door to section off the windows, tv and polished wood table from the sleeping area. It had looked fancy and fun when they first arrived, but Sehun’s cold and the bath will be deep. “Hyung,” Sehun picks at the ring pull on his unopened chuhai, “I’ll use the bathroom first.”   
  
Chanyeol nods. He looks like a dog, both hands planted on the floor so he can lean close to the screen.   
  
“Do you want this?” Sehun nudges the tin along the table. It’s grapefruit flavour and there’s ice on the label and Sehun’s not even sure why he bought it. If the kettle had worked all he’d have been able to make is green tea, and they’re in Kyoto, so it’s not going to be the friendly sweetened kind.   
  
  
Their futons are laid out a foot apart. Sehun wants the pink one.   
  
“I think that love hotel is a good idea,” he says with the duvet pulled up to his chin. It’s kinda musty, so he pushes it back down. “The one outside the shrine.”   
  
Chanyeol’s side of the room is silent. The air still feels damp from him leaving the bathroom door open to get some of the heat and moisture out of the cramped space while he had his turn in the bath.   
  
“Really?”   
  
“Really. That’s what the shrine is for, right? The transitional point in a relationship.”   
  
“I guess it’s not like deities really mind sex,” Chanyeol muses. “If you think about what happens in folklore, like, from all cultures..” he starts, but it’s coming out all drifty. He drank enough of Sehun’s unwanted alcohol for thoughts he knows well to get lazy and muddled. They’re not having the same conversation.   
  
“How many people visit with someone who’s helping them to break up, though, I wonder,” Sehun continues. Chanyeol didn’t say it. One of them needs to. “It’s just a temptation in that case, right? Makes it seem like a good idea.”   
  
Chanyeol says nothing again. Maybe it’s moonlight that’s pooling in so bright through the screen doors that Sehun can see his own cold hands folded outside the futon. Maybe it’s the moon. It’s probably just neon.   
  
“Oh, you know. Damn. We didn’t buy any omamori,” Chanyeol says, and Sehun hears the smack of his palm to his forehead, “I promised my sister I’d get her one for her driving test. We were right there at tourist central and I totally forgot.”   
  
“I wouldn’t have said no if you’d asked.” If he looked Sehun would be able to make out Chanyeol’s features well enough to see if he’s looking over. He didn’t like how Chanyeol looked at him when they were standing between the shrine gates. “I’d have gone in with you if you’d asked. But you didn’t. You don’t want to?”   
  
Chanyeol squeezes his eyes tight shut. You don’t just _talk_ about things like this. But it’s Sehun, and Sehun’s learned relationships from Zitao. And it’s not like Chanyeol’s ever tried to hide it - it just hasn’t mattered. Zitao stopped it from mattering, and now he’s gone and Chanyeol’s feelings haven’t.   
  
“Oh Sehun, what kind of guy do you think I am?” he tries to sound sullen. “Yeah I love you, but who’s to say that means I want to jump in bed with you?”   
  
Fair. Sehun sighs long and deep, hands sinking into the concave of his stomach. “I know how that works.”   
  
“Yeah. I didn’t think you two even had sex. So how would the whole.. closure, rebound thing even..”   
  
“We didn’t.” Sehun’s entirely sure Zitao hasn’t fucked anyone to get over him. Probably just buried back into his music and gone back to gaming until sunrise. Zitao functions just as well without romance as he does with it. “The difference is just that I can now. I can fuck whoever I want,” he says, then wants to curl up small. He’s never done this before, and it doesn’t..it doesn’t feel how he thought it would. How it looks in songs and movies. Bitterness isn’t cathartic at all. “I don’t want to. I mean, I just could. It was fine. You know I went into that relationship knowing it’d be like that, I never minded. I’d never have touched anyone else when we were together.”   
  
Chanyeol hums. He sounds sleepy. A foot away from him in the pink futon Sehun aches with affection for Chanyeol, for the safe familiarity of how he speaks and sounds and feels. Even if it was like with Zitao and they never made love (because that’s what Chanyeol would do, with Sehun. _Fuck_ is a word he always has to unstick from the back of his throat), it still wouldn’t be how he’d felt for Zitao at all. He loves Chanyeol too, so much, but it's not the same kind of love.  
  
“Well, let’s put it down to that, then. Yeah?” Chanyeol’s voice shifts; he’s turned to face Sehun. “You haven’t been with anyone for three years. It’s probably best if I’m not the person you take that out on.”   
  
“You’re the only one I’d trust,” Sehun says, and he has no right to be the one that’s upset by this. But he is. Zitao couldn’t keep him and the only person who’s always loved him doesn’t want him.   
  
“I know.” That’s enough. He’s lost, though Sehun’s not exactly winning some prize feelings here. “It would hurt too much. Ok? Other than that I’d do anything to help you feel better.” Cold air hits Chanyeol’s shoulder and floods down his back as he leans up on his elbow to look across at Sehun. “You know that’s what this was about, right? I wanted you to get some closure on things. It wasn’t so I..”   
  
Sehun sighs again, all wet and rattling in the back of his throat. “Of course I know that. You’re too nice, hyung, I didn’t think it was all some ulterior motive thing.”   
  
Chanyeol musses his hair, rubs his palm over his face. “Shame, huh. If I was a jerk maybe you’d fall for me.”   
  
Chanyeol and Zitao never got along. Chanyeol neither tried to make an effort to nor tried to make things difficult. They just loved Sehun between them and butted heads every time they were left alone without him. Love Sehun, still. Sehun’s bereft, not betrayed.   
  
It’s so cold Sehun’s nose is stinging. Cold, smooth tatami under his feet. Chanyeol doesn’t run hot at all.   
  
“I’ve always felt selfish, hyung,” Sehun says, in Chanyeol’s green futon, being selfish right now. He’s known for so long that his best friend is in love with him it’s almost a kind of comfort. A fallback. Whatever else happens, there’s always someone who thinks he’s worth loving.   
  
Chanyeol hums, and now Sehun’s here tucked under his chin he can feel just how heavy with sleep and chuhai Chanyeol is. “And I’ve always felt lucky. If you’d cut me off it would have been worse. For me, anyway.” Maybe Chanyeol’s always been kind of selfish, too. “I’ve always been grateful you don’t mind me still being around you.”   
  
“Being loved feels nice.” Zitao’s gone. Gone for good. It’s just the two of them and Chanyeol’s feelings now. “I’m selfish.”   
  
“You just had your heart broken. Don’t think about it too much right now.”   
  
It’s really not that hard, doing this. Maybe it depends how you cultivate that love. Of course Chanyeol’s heart is in his throat right now, of course he’s scared to breathe - to move, prompt Sehun to move, so his mouth isn’t pressing to the top of his head anymore. It’s whether you have false hope or not that makes it hurt. This is just- Sehun’s breath over his chest, his hair coarse against Chanyeol’s neck and chin. His hand on Chanyeol’s ribs and the hot, soft curve of his cock against Chanyeol’s hip. It’d be a good way to die.   
  
“Did I break yours?”   
  
“No. Never, Sehunnie. You didn’t.” It’s easy to say because it’s true. Chanyeol has Sehun right here in his arms, and one day he’ll feel this way for someone who feels it back. “You aren’t selfish for not feeling the same way. I don’t know what you saw in that guy, but your heart just wants what it wants, right?”   
  
“I don’t think his heart broke. Don’t hate him when I say things like that,” Sehun presses his cold nose in hard against Chanyeol’s neck. “I just don’t.. I mean, I do understand how he felt. It worked, ‘n we were happy. Just feels like maybe this is easier for him.”   
  
Really, the hard part of this for Chanyeol is having to make civil conversation about Huang Zitao for so long. “If he felt ok he’d still be in touch. And when he does feel ok again, you get to decide if you want to talk.”   
  
That Sehun doesn’t instantly know what he’d do must be a sign he’s at least more over it than he’d been a month ago. Last month he’d have taken anything. But then Chanyeol had this trip booked, and the planning and travelling made the days speed up again. Sehun pulls back and looks at Chanyeol, all grey and blue from the light through the paper screens. “Can I ask for something that’s definitely selfish?”   
  
There’s only one thing it’s going to be. There’s no way Chanyeol can kiss Sehun with his heart right in his mouth like this. Chanyeol blinks at him, surprised by the implication if not the request. “He didn’t even like kissing?”   
  
Sehun ducks his head back in. “He did. We- did. I miss it.” He’s always been so.. needy isn’t a nice word, but that’s how he gets for affection, and it’s easy to get away with when you’re the baby of the group. Chanyeol’s so warm and reassuring and good to touch, so good to be held by. Maybe it doesn’t make him such an awful person, if Chanyeol would rather have these moments than not. “I’m trying really hard, hyung. I promise I’ll be better. I’ll get over it.”   
  
“You’d better.” Chanyeol’s tone is the one he uses when he shoves people. His arms feel stiff and less comfortable around Sehun’s waist. “After I paid out for this hotel and found the shrine and everything.”   
  
They’ve kissed before. Three times - when they were much younger Chanyeol was more open to opportunities. A dare and a celebration. And when Sehun was 19, and he thought he maybe kinda liked that guy, the one from China that had persistently befriended him in the two weeks since he’d arrived. But Sehun had never kinda liked a guy before, so would- maybe kissing Chanyeol would help contextualise that feeling. If he really likes boys or if he only likes Zitao, or if he’s just entirely confused.   
  
Chanyeol’s memory of that day - hiding in a locked bathroom stall at his family’s restaurant and holding their breath whenever they heard footsteps - it’s old and probably inaccurately shiny and good. The way his neck is stinging with heat now is exactly the same. Chanyeol’s never really known either, if he likes boys or only Sehun.   
  
“You can have one,” he mumbles into Sehun’s hair, feels Sehun’s fingers curl hard into his ribs. “Just one, Oh Sehun. No being cute and trying to get more..you know I can’t say no to you when you’re cute.”   
  
Sehun nods. “Promise. Can I stay in here with you tonight?”   
  
“You’re getting away with as much as you can today, aren’t you,” Chanyeol musses his hair and it’s out of place with the mood, but he’s getting jittery. He’s not one to turn down opportunities to cuddle, but it’s not every day you get to kiss the love of your life. Just a gentle little kiss. He hopes, or it’ll be Chanyeol’s dick along with his feelings in bed with them. That..is way too likely to risk it, honestly. He sighs, and Sehun squirms away from the hot puff of air. “So long as you’re big spoon, ok?”   
  
“You’re the worst hyung,” Sehun noses at his cheek, “Making a baby go on the outside.”   
  
“No, you’re the worst.” For taking advantage of this useless soft hyung, always helpless when Sehun wants something. Chanyeol doesn’t finish the thought. Sehun leans into the warmth of a palm to his jaw and thinks yeah, he probably is. 

  
• 

  
They catch the early train, Osaka bound. The sun is out and giving off some warmth by the time they’re on the transfer to Nanba. Sehun suggests bibimbap in the food hall, pulling Chanyeol away from the station’s basement exit by his wrist.   
  
  
“We just missed the plum blossom, you know. By like three days.”   
  
“Oh?” Sehun twists in his seat to look at Chanyeol’s phone on the table. Chanyeol doesn’t even really like the pickles they have here, but he takes the opportunity to lean in and pinch some out of Sehun’s dish just to make him scowl. Sehun swats him away, still looking at the screen. “Shame, they’re pretty. So cold though, walking around.”   
  
“Mm.” The heat in here combined with the food is making for a much warmer time than they had yesterday. At this rate they’re not even going to want to leave the station. No shopping today, just eating and keeping their hands warm.   
  
“Maybe we could come back for han..” _bi_ makes it a firework. Sehun remembers that from the dictionary - bi, hi. Flower, fire. “Hana _mi_ ,” he gets it, leaning into the word. Chanyeol beams. “Hanami. Lets come back for it in spring. Cherry blossoms are prettier, anyway.”   
  
“You really want to? I’d like that.”   
  
“I’d like to. Really.” Maybe not so much for the blossom - they have enough of it at home - but Chanyeol will love it. By two months time everything will feel different. Setting the metal chopsticks down, Sehun leans out of his seat and drops his head to Chanyeol’s shoulder. “So long as you pull me up any hills.”   
  
The more Chanyeol huffs and sighs the more Sehun grins and leans into him. He can never say no. “Deal.”

**Author's Note:**

> mmm I have a lot of feelings about the complexities of love when it starts getting broken down into romantic and platonic and where sexuality ties into it. anyway, thank you for reading ! ☀ at [tumbl](https://taonsil.tumblr.com) ❀ [twt](https://twitter.com/taonsil) if you wanna talk or be buried in suyeol


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